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Precise spectroscopy of the hyperfine level system of

The Plant & Food Research Actinidia (kiwifruit) germplasm repository contains over 3000 genotypes from circa 350 accessions. The collection provides genetic diversity for breeding new commercial cultivars. Maintenance of the collection has become a major challenge following the arrival and spread in New Zealand of a bacterial canker disease caused by a virulent pathovar of Pseudomonas syringae pv. actinidiae (Psa). Over 80% of diploid A. chinensis Planch seedlings in the collection have shown severe symptoms of infection and many have died. The potential loss of alleles from the collection is a major concern. A substantial reduction in genetic diversity would constrain the development of new kiwifruit cultivars and undermine the potential of populations to respond to changing environmental conditions. We aim to retain as many as possible of the alleles responsible for various key traits such as fruit size, yield and different flavour profiles by using a carefully designed wide-crossing strategy. To avoid a genetic bottleneck in the A. chinensis germplasm, a crossing program comprising 70 males and 35 females was carried out in 2011. Pollen from the 70 males was bulked into 10 groups each of seven individual male parents and used in polycrosses to produce new breeding lines. A total of 4363 seedlings from these polycrosses were propagated and planted out in our research orchard, with 2185 subsequently lost to Psa. The seedling population is under continuous screening for key traits, including Psa tolerance. Another round of crosses will be made within the population, aiming to maintain allelic diversity. Other strategies for maintaining allelic diversity, such as tissue culture and storing pollen and seed, are also being followed. However, the wide crossing approach has the advantage that the seedlings can be used in breeding while we continue to monitor their performance in a Psa environment.

We created high-resolution atomic frequency combs (AFCs) and optimized the pulse sequence used in AFC memory to realize highly efficient AFC quantum memory using the 167Er3+:Y2SiO5 hyperfine level system. As a result, the formation and relaxation times of AFCs were revealed, and AFCs with a resolution of 800 kHz were created by using an appropriate pump light intensity. An efficiency of 0.16% with a memory time of 0.5 µs was achieved even under a zero magnetic field and a 10 ppm Er concentration sample. This result paves the way for realizing highly efficient communication-wavelength AFC quantum memory.

Branching is a key determinant of architectural quality of ornamental plants. Using plants trained to a single primary shoot, cultivars of Japanese maple (Acer sp.) 'Fireglow', 'Katsura', 'Orangeola', 'Red Emperor', 'Skeeter's Broom' and 'Sango Kaku' presented a diverse range of growth and sylleptic branching patterns. Shoot extension was more vigorous in 'Sango Kaku', which displayed uninterrupted extension to develop more than 30 metamers. In other cultivars, some primary shoots had a pause after extension of approximately six preformed metamers, forming shorter bicyclic shoots (e.g., 'Red Emperor'); and some of the shoots were monocyclic, comprising mostly preformed metamers (e.g., 'Fireglow'). Sylleptic branching in the six cultivars differed in both branching intensity and the location of branches along the primary shoot. 'Sango Kaku' and 'Katsura' featured two intensely branched zones with lower branching frequency between them. 'Orangeola' and 'Skeeter's Broom' had a single branching zone with lower branching intensity located at the basal and middle sections of the parent shoot, respectively. In addition, xylem sap of 'Red Emperor' contained more strigolactone than that of 'Sango Kaku', supporting the hypothesis that sylleptic branching appears to correlate inversely with the amount of strigolactone. The above results support the hypothesis that the occurrence of sylleptic branching and these branches' distribution along the primary shoot are subject to combined hormonal and developmental control. Possible relationships between the primary shoot organogenesis/extension and the time course of sylleptic branching are currently being investigated.

Aim. To find an optimal way of end colostoma formation in patients with colorectal cancer following abdominoperineal extirpation of the rectum. Methods. Results of surgical treatment (rectum extirpation ended with sigmoidostomy) of 142 patients with malignant tumors of lower part of rectal ampulla treated from 2005 to 2012 are presented. Data of 101 patients (comparison group) were retrospectively analyzed, in whom the same approach of choosing the colostomy technique was applied. The main group consisted of 41 patients in whom the efficacy of authors-introduced technique of colostomy with alloplasty for colostomal wound consolidation from the abdominal cavity side was prospectively defined. Results. The prevalence of early post-operative stomal complications was 18,8% (in 19 out of 109 patients) in comparison group. Ileum volvulus around the stoma causing bowel obstruction was diagnosed in 2 cases, necrosis of stoma wall - in 2 patients, evisceration around stoma site - in 3 patients, perforation of sigmoid stoma - in 1 patient, stoma retraction - in 1 patient, bleeding at stoma site - in 3 patients, paracolostomal mass - in 1 patient. 14 patients from comparison group developed late post-operative stomal complications, including parastomal hernia - 8 patients, stoma prolapse - 3 patients, colostomal fistula - 1 patient, stomal stenosis - 2 patients. Treatment results in the patients from the main group were satisfactory. Early complications included 1 case of bleeding from stoma site, 1 case of partial necrosis of stoma wall. No late complications were registered. The gained data allows to provide successful rehabilitation to patients who underwent colorectal cancer surgery. The described technique is contraindicated in case of infected peritoneal effusion. Conclusion. The use of the method proposed by authors not only significantly improves colostomy results, but significantly decreases the rate of both early and late post-operative complications of stomas compared to standard methods.

A conductance wire mesh sensor system has been employed on a vertical 67 mm diameter pipe with the up flow of air and water mixtures. The measuring system provides time and cross-sectionally resolved information about the spatial distribution of the phases. Statistical information can be extracted and used to identify flow patterns. The fully resolved data has revealed a hitherto unreported structure has been seen in churn flow which could be linked to the wisps in wispy-annular flow.

Experimental work on two-phase vertical upward flow was carried out using a 19 mm internal diameter, 7 m long pipe and studying the time series of cross-sectional average void fractions and pressure gradient which were obtained simultaneously. With the aid of a bank of published data in which the pipe diameter is the range from 0.5 to 70 mm, the effect of pipe diameter on flow characteristics of two-phase flow is investigated from various aspects. Particularly, the work focuses on the periodic structures of two-phase flow. Average film thicknesses and the gas flow rate where slug/churn and churn/annular flow transitions occur all increase as the diameter of the pipe becomes larger. On the other hand, the pressure gradients, the frequencies of the periodic structures and the velocities of disturbance waves decrease. The velocity of disturbance waves has been used to test the model of Pearce (1979). It is found that the suggested value of Pearce coefficient 0.8 is reasonable for lower liquid flow rates but becomes insufficient for higher liquid flow rates.

Void fraction, Taylor bubble and liquid slug lengths, and slug frequency are parameters essential to any description of the structure of slug flow. In the present study, these parameters were extracted from the time series of cross-sectionally averaged void fraction obtained from two vertical facilities having similar internal pipe diameter but significantly different axial lengths; 51.2 mm/3.5 m and 52.3 mm/9 m. In order to study slug flow, the flow rates for which it occurred were first identified. To investigate the effect of flow development on slug characteristics measurements were carried out at several axial locations from the mixing section for both facilities. For slug frequency, a new correlation including the effect of the axial length has been proposed and assessed using previously published data.

A twin-plane electrical capacitance tomography (ECT) system has been employed to monitor the flow rate of fine coal transported by air in a 36.8 mm diameter pipe at mass fluxes of 1680 kg/m2 s. The mean mass flow rate was obtained to be within

Multifocal motor neuropathy is a unique disease that not only challenges the electromyographer to make differential diagnosis from a fatal disease but also provides an opportunity to reconsider the mechanism of conduction block in demyelinating neuropathies. Conduction block or slowing is not always a consequence of demyelination, but can be due to membrane hyperpolarisation or depolarisation, as well as sodium channel blockage. Recent pieces of evidence suggest that clinical features of multifocal motor neuropathy, such as fasciculations, muscle fatigue, cold paralysis, sensory sparing and secondary axonal degeneration, can be explained by depolarisation and hyperpolarisation block in addition to focal demyelination.

Lesion-mimic mutants are useful for investigating mechanisms of disease resistance. We have characterized five lesion-mimic mutants of rice (Oryza sativa L.): spotted leaf 5–2 (spl5–2), Spl12, spl13, spl14, and Spl15, that have broad-spectrum resistance to the rice blast fungus Magnaporthe grisea and the bacterial blight pathogen Xanthomonas campestris pv. oryzae. Autofluorescence, a sign of disease resistance response, was detected in leaf-sheath cells of the spl mutants in the absence of pathogens. In addition, three pathogenesis-related genes, PBZ1, PR1, and Cht3, were expressed in spl5–2, Spl12, and Spl15 after the appearance of lesion-mimicry. In contrast, expression of these genes in spl13 and spl14 started before lesion formation. Interestingly, in spl13 and spl14, enhanced resistance to rice blast and bacterial blight was also induced before the appearance of lesion-mimicry. These results demonstrate that disease resistance is differently expressed in the spl mutants.

Lasing from the ground state electron and heavy-hole-like transition of quantum wire (QWR) is demonstrated for the first time at room temperature, with an oxide-isolated V-grooved GaAs/AlGaAs triple QWR laser grown by flow-rate modulation epitaxy (FME). The lasing peaks at all temperatures (4– 300 K ) are in reasonably good agreement with both the photon energies of the peaks of the photoluminescence curves and the numerical calculation of the electronic sub-band energy states of the corresponding QWR structure. These results are considered to be responsible for the reduced heterointerface inhomogeneities (the Stokes shift ∼0.3 meV ) of the FME grown QWR, giving a low-loss wave guide in the QWR laser.

A combined method of the beam propagation method (BPM) and the mode expansion propagation method (MEPM) is proposed for the analysis of reflections of both transverse electric (TE) and transverse magnetic (TM) polarized waves in waveguiding structures containing longitudinal discontinuities. BPM based on the finite-element method (FEM) is applied to slowly varying regions and MEPM is applied only to regions including abrupt discontinuities. FEM is also utilized for evaluating the eigenmodes necessary for the MEPM analysis. To show the validity and usefulness of the present approach, numerical examples for a semiconductor laser facet with antireflection coating and an optical directional coupler are presented.

An equivalent network approach is developed for the analysis of the guided electron wave obliquely incident on step discontinuities in planar heterostructures. Stress is placed on network representations to establish physical pictures of the quantum effects and to yield insight; in addition, a systematic: microwave network approach is employed. A coordinate transformation translates an "eigencoordinate mode" of the guided electron wave propagating at an angle to the step discontinuity into a "structure coordinate mode" propagating normally to the step discontinuity, so that the step can be viewed as a transverse discontinuity and a procedure for the normal incidence can directly be exploited; transmission line equations in the direction normal to the step discontinuity, the mode-matching procedure for the boundary-value problem, and an equivalent network for the guided electron wave obliquely incident on the step discontinuities can be obtained. Using this network, the input admittance formulation is carried out, with which one can easily derive the equations that estimate the scattering and waveguiding characteristics of the guided electron wave obliquely incident on step discontinuities. Numerical examples are presented for a three-layered electron waveguide with a stub, and it is shown that this structure operates as a channel waveguide in addition to an angle filter.

A numerical approach based on the finite element method is described for the solution of electron waveguide discontinuities with arbitrary potential and effective-mass distributions. Analytical solutions are introduced for the uniform waveguide regions. The approach is applied to a quantum field effect directional coupler with finite coupling length and longitudinal discontinuities. The effects of the longitudinal interference due to the discontinuities and of the transverse interference due to the even and odd supermodes in the coupling region are studied. The influence of the shape of the wire-tip on the transmission properties is also investigated.

We found a new point mutation in the mitochondrial tRNA Ser(UCN) gene in a family with MERRF/MELAS overlap syndrome by screening for heteroplasmy by means of chemical cleavage of mismatch (CCM). Our strategy was based on the previous observations that most pathogenic mtDNA mutations in mitochondrial encephalomyopathies are heteroplasmic, whereas almost all neutral mitochondrial polymorphisms are homoplasmic. CCM followed by nucleotide sequencing of the corresponding region of the mitochondrial genome revealed a heteroplasmic mutation at nt 7512 in the tRNA Ser(UCN) gene. The 7512 (T to C) mutation disrupts a highly conserved base pair in the acceptor stem, and this mutation was not found in any of 120 normal controls, or in 43 patients with mitochondrial diseases. The proportion of the mutant mtDNA was 93% in muscle, 76 and 87% in the blood of the patients. A family member without apparent neuromuscular symptoms carried less mutant mtDNA. These findings support the view that this mutation is pathogenic in this family. Detection of heteroplasmy by CCM is an efficient means of screening pathogenic mtDNA point mutations.

Patients with focal dystonia take advantage of certain cutaneous or proprioceptive sensory inputs to alleviate their symptoms ("sensory trick"). We examined the effects of increasing muscle spindle activity by the tonic vibration reflex maneuver and decreasing it by intramuscular injection of lidocaine. The vibration was applied to the palm or the tendon of forearm muscles in 15 patients with writer's cramp and 15 age-matched normal subjects. In 11 patients, the vibration induced dystonic postures or movements typical of those seen during writing. Normal subjects showed either no response to the vibration or a gradually developing tonic vibration reflex only in the wrist and finger flexors, which produced visible movements with a significantly longer latency (12.5 +/- 6.7 seconds [mean +/- standard deviation]) than what was observed in the patients (2.7 +/- 2.5 seconds, p < 0.0001). Local injection of lidocaine (0.5%, 5-40 ml/muscle) attenuated the tendon reflex with relatively little effect on the M response. Injection into muscles with increased activity produced marked reduction of dystonic movements and significant clinical improvement in 13 patients, whereas injection into the other muscles had no effect. The clinical benefit lasted for 1 to 24 hours after injection. In 13 patients who had additional injections of 10% ethanol, which blocks sodium channels for a longer period than does lidocaine, the duration of action was prolonged to 5 to 21 days. These findings suggest that muscles causing dystonic movements have abnormal sensitivities to vibration at rest and that muscle afferents may play a pivotal role in producing dystonic movements.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

An analysis method is described for multistep discontinuities in electron waveguides composed of semiconductor heterostructures. The method is based on a rigorous mode-matching procedure that takes into account the effects of external finite potential and spatially varying effective mass. Stress is placed on network representations to establish physical pictures of the quantum effects and to yield insight; in addition, a systematic microwave network approach is employed. The equivalent network representation is given for the waveguide modes propagating normally to the step discontinuity, and the mode-matching procedure is described for the boundary-value problem of the step discontinuity. Combining the above two procedures, the super-cascade matrix formulation is carried out, from which the reflection and transmission characteristics of multistep discontinuities in electron waveguides can be estimated. In order to show the validity and usefulness of this approach, examples are computed for constriction structures composed of three-layered electron waveguides. >

To investigate the pathophysiology of dystonia, we recorded contingent negative variation (CNV) in 12 patients with cervical dystonia and in 12 age-matched normal subjects. In a simple reaction time paradigm, the subjects were given a pair of a warning stimulus and a subsequent stimulus that triggered head rotation to either side or extension of the fingers. In normal subjects, CNVs for head rotation were not affected by neck muscle pre-activation simulating torticollis, and were always symmetrical with equally high amplitudes over the frontal and central leads. By contrast, CNVs for finger movement had the maximum over the central lead and showed a characteristic distribution; those for the right finger movement had the left hemisphere dominance, whereas those for the left finger movement had similar amplitudes over both hemispheres. In patients with rotatory torticollis (rotatocollis), the components of CNVs for head rotation were markedly attenuated in all the leads, except for the initial negative deflection (orienting response). As a whole, cervical dystonia patients had significantly lower amplitudes of late CNVs for head rotation than normal subjects (P < 0.001), whereas late CNV amplitudes in finger extension did not differ in the two groups. Their reaction times for head rotation were similar, but durations of EMG activities were prolonged in the patients because of co-contractions of the antagonists. The task-specific CNV amplitude loss is therefore not explained by reaction times or by the abnormal neck muscle activities prior to the movement, but it reflects a failure of neural activities preparing for a phasic neck movement, resulting in co-contraction of the agonists and the antagonist. Dystonia may be associated with defective retrieval or retaining of specific motor programmes or subroutines in response to sensory stimuli.

Using a simple approach based on the scalar finite element method, propagation characteristics of multilayer channel waveguides are calculated. The effective index, modal field, confinement factor, far-field intensity pattern, and radiation angle of the far-field pattern (full width at half maximum intensity) for multilayer channel waveguides formed with multiple quantum well (MQW) materials and with the MQW materials replaced by a single homogeneous material with the root mean square value of the refractive indexes are compared. Numerical results confirm that the root-mean-square-value approximation, which has been widely used for planar MQW (two-dimensional) waveguides, is useful also for MQW channel (three-dimensional) waveguides with a large number of layers. >

By utilizing an analogy in electromagnetic wave propagation, an equivalent network procedure is described for guided electron waves in quantum-well structures. It relies heavily on the earlier achievements of the microwave network approach, and it involves the application of concepts and techniques in electromagnetic waves to corresponding categories of electron waves. To demonstrate the validity and usefulness of this approach, it is used to derive the properties of electron waveguides consisting of single or double quantum wells. Based on the results of the analysis of propagation characteristics of the guided electron waves in these structures, the coupling properties of the double-quantum-well electron waveguide are also examined under the coupled-mode procedure. >

Mathematical expressions are given for guided and radiation modes including nonpropagating parts in three-layered electron waveguides, in addition to gaining a clear understanding of the difference between electron and optical waveguides in terms of normal modes. According to the dispersion diagrams, it is shown that a complete set of normal modes for electron waveguides depends on the electron's total energy and that in the quantum-well-type waveguide the discrete modes and the continuous modes radiating to one side of the film are reduced to nonpropagating modes in a certain energy range, whereas a complete set of normal modes for optical waveguides always consists of three types of modes: guided modes, substrate radiation modes, and substrate-cover radiation modes. In addition, the discrete modes and the continuous modes radiating to one side of the film are not reduced to nonpropagating modes in the entire range of frequencies. Also, it is shown that the guided modes always exist in electron waveguides composed of arbitrarily different Al-concentration ratios in the film, substrate, and cover regions, and a new waveguiding quantum-step-type structure, which utilizes the total reflection at both the potential rise and drop is proposed, whereas in optical waveguides, the guided modes exist only in the structure in which the refractive index of the film is higher than those of the substrate and of the cover. >

A 78-year-old man had non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) in the left upper lobe (squamous cell carcinoma, cT1N0M0). He preferred less invasive treatment and undertook stereotactic radiotherapy (SRT)[48 Gy/4 Fr] because his forced expiratory volume in 1 second percent (FEV1.0%) was 53.50%. The therapeutic effect was partial response and the adverse reaction was dermatitis (grade 1). Seven months after SRT, local recurrence was detected. The tumor was growing from 3 x 5 mm to 25 x 25 mm in size. Nine months after SRT, left upper lobectomy was performed successfully unaffected by SRT. He is doing well 14 months after the operation without any signs of recurrence. This case might help develop a new strategy for the treatment of stage I NSCLC. It is that patients with stage I NSCLC have SRT as 1st line treatment, and if local recurrence is observed after SRT, lobectomy may be performed.

We have been developing specific guest guiding system based on compact battery-less information terminals, Aimulet. Implemented conventional Aimulet has features of location and direction sensitive information service device without batteries. On the other hand, the Annulet has two subjects, one is multi-lingual service and another is interactivity. These subjects are solved by using wavelength division multiplex technique and active RFID or/and reflectivity modulation. These techniques are applied to the EXPO 2005, Aichi Japan and other demonstrations.

In a waveguide using carbon nanotube-polyimide core we discovered polarized absorption probably due to the molecular alignment of nanotubes in the polyimide matrix. We observed efficient saturable absorption at the polarization along the molecular alignment.

Carbon nanotube polyimide nanocomposite material has been developed. This material can be applited to mode-lockers for fiber and solid state lasers with high controllability and reproducibility. This material can be fabricated into nonlinear optical waveguide devices.

We report high-resolution angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) on ${\mathrm{C}\mathrm{a}\mathrm{B}}_{6}$. The band structure determined by ARPES shows a 1 eV energy gap at the $X$ point between the valence and the conduction bands. We found a small electron pocket at the $X$ point, whose carrier number is estimated to be $(4--5)\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}{10}^{19}\text{ }{\mathrm{c}\mathrm{m}}^{\ensuremath{-}3}$, in good agreement with the Hall resistivity measurement with the same crystal. The experimental results are discussed in comparison with band structure calculations and theoretical models for the high-temperature ferromagnetism.

Background EGFR mutation is independently associated with a favorable response in NSCLC patients receiving EGFR-TKIs, regardless of gender or smoking history. However, recent reports have indicated that squamous cell carcinoma patients harboring EGFR mutations show a worse response to EGFR-TKIs than adenocarcinoma patients. We hypothesized that serum CYFRA21-1 is a predictive marker in EGFR-mutated patients treated with EGFR-TKIs. Methods We retrospectively screened 160 NSCLC patients harboring EGFR mutations (exon 19 deletions, L858R in exon 21, or other minor mutations) who received either gefitinib or erlotinib between 1992 and 2011. Patients were screened for histology, sex, age, smoking status, efficacy of EGFR-TKI and tumor markers (CEA/CYFRA21-1) at initial diagnosis. Results Out of 160 eligible patients treated with EGFR-TKIs, 77 patients with a high CYFRA21-1 level (>2 ng/ml) showed statistically shorter progression-free survival (PFS) than 83 patients with a normal CYFRA21-1 level (median PFS 7.5 versus 14.0 months, P = 0.006). No significant difference in PFS was observed between the high CEA group (>5 ng/ml) and the normal CEA group (median PFS 8.6 versus 11.2 months, P = 0.2423). Multivariate analysis revealed that a high CYFRA21-1 level is independently associated with PFS (HR 1.35; P = 0.002) as well as squamous cell carcinoma (HR 1.40; P = 0.020) and performance status 2–4 (HR 2.63; P = 0.003). No statistically significant difference in overall survival (OS) was observed between the high CYFRA21-1 group and the normal group (median OS 24.8 versus 39.1 months, P = 0.104). Conclusions High CYFRA level patients have significantly shorter PFS, which may indicate that this subgroup has a larger squamous component and thus less response to EGFR-TKIs. The serum CYFRA21-1 level is a predictive marker of EGFR-TKIs efficacy and EGFR-mutated patients can be divided into two subgroups according to the CYFRA21-1 level at initial diagnosis.

Three genes commonly causing Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease (CMT) encode myelin-related proteins: peripheral myelin protein 22 (PMP22), myelin protein zero (MPZ) and connexin 32 (Cx32). Demyelinating versus axonal phenotypes are major issues in CMT associated with mutations of these genes. We electrophysiologically, pathologically and genetically evaluated demyelinating and axonal features of 205 Japanese patients with PMP22 duplication, MPZ mutations or Cx32 mutations. PMP22 duplication caused mainly demyelinating phenotypes with slowed motor nerve conduction velocity (MCV) and demyelinating histopathology, while axonal features were variably present. Two distinctive phenotypic subgroups were present in patients with MPZ mutations: one showed preserved MCV and exclusively axonal pathological features, while the other was exclusively demyelinating. These axonal and demyelinating phenotypes were well concordant among siblings in individual families, and MPZ mutations did not overlap among these two subgroups, suggesting that the nature and position of the MPZ mutations mainly determine the axonal and demyelinating phenotypes. Patients with Cx32 mutations showed intermediate slowing of MCV, predominantly axonal features and relatively mild demyelinating pathology. These axonal and demyelinating features were present concomitantly in individual patients to a variable extent. The relative severity of axonal and demyelinating features was not associated with particular Cx32 mutations. Median nerve MCV and overall histopathological phenotype changed little with disease advancement. Axonal features of diminished amplitudes of compound muscle action potentials (CMAPs), axonal loss, axonal sprouting and neuropathic muscle wasting all changed as disease advanced, especially in PMP22 duplication and Cx32 mutations. Median nerve MCVs were well maintained independently of age, disease duration and the severity of clinical and pathological abnormalities, confirming that median nerve MCV is an excellent marker for the genetically determined neuropathic phenotypes. Amplitude of CMAPs was correlated significantly with distal muscle strength in PMP22 duplication, MPZ mutations and Cx32 mutations, while MCV slowing was not, indicating that clinical weakness results from reduced numbers of functional large axons, not from demyelination. Thus, the three major myelin-related protein mutations induced varied degrees of axonal and demyelinating phenotypic features according to the specific gene mutation as well as the stage of disease advancement, while clinically evident muscle wasting was attributable to loss of functioning large axons.

Basal ganglia lie between the cerebral cortex and the thalamus, and have dense fiber connections between them. These connections form 4-5 distinct loops to allow parallel processing of information. Among them, the most intensively studied is the motor loop, which comprises 2 distinct direct and indirect pathways. The direct pathway disinhibits the powerful inhibition of Gpi/SNr upon the thalamic VL nuclei with a net result of facilitatory influence upon the motor cortex. By contrast, the indirect pathway exerts an inhibitory effect. Overall this dual system provides a center-surround mechanism to focus its effect on selected cortical neurons. The functional role of the loop in motor control has not been precisely understood. Several lines of evidence have recently been presented to support the view that this mechanism is used to focus the output to a specific group of muscles required for performing a specific task. Recent observations in dystonia and Parkinsonism suggest that this operation is made possible through opening the sensory channel for the expected sensory feed-back afferents during movement. Thus one of the important functions of basal ganglia seems to be the gating of sensory input for motor control.

We report high-resolution angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) on CaB6. The band structure determined by ARPES shows a 1 eV energy gap at the X point between the valence and the conduction bands. We found a small electron pocket at the X point, whose carrier number is estimated to be (4-5) x 10(19) cm(-3), in good agreement with the Hall resistivity measurement with the same crystal. The experimental results are discussed in comparison with band structure calculations and theoretical models for the high-temperature ferromagnetism.

Basal ganglia lie between the cerebral cortex and the thalamus, and have dense fiber connections between them. These connections form 4-5 distinct loops or circuits to allow parallel processing of information. Among them, the most intensively studied is the motor loop, which comprises 2 distinct direct and indirect pathways. The direct pathway disinhibits the powerful inhibition of the internal segment of the globus pallidus/substantia nigra pars reticulata upon thalamic ventrolateral nuclei with a net result of facilitatory influence upon the motor cortex. By contrast, the indirect pathway exerts an inhibitory effect. Overall this dual system provides a center (excitatory)-surround (inhibitory) mechanism to focus its effect on selected cortical neurons. Although putative transmitters, inhibitory or excitatory nature of these projections and their receptors are mostly known, the functional role of the loop in motor control is not precisely understood. Several lines of evidence have recently been presented to support the view that this center-surround mechanism is used to focus the output to a specific group of muscles required for performing a specific task. This operation is made possible through opening the sensory channel for the expected sensory feed-back afferents during movement. Thus one of the important functions of basal ganglia seems to be the gating of sensory input for motor control.

We performed long-term video/ EEG monitoring and a single photon emission computed tomographic (SPECT) study to clarify generating mechanism of bilateral tonic motor seizures resembling seizures generated by the supplementary motor area (SMA), in patients with bilateral parietal lesions. We describe 2 patients (age 24 and 32 years), with bilateral parietal lesions. Clinically, seizures were preceded by lightning sensation in the body, followed by asymmetric tonic posturing of both hands and thrashing movements of the feet, lasting for less than 1 min. Ictal rhythmic (7-15 Hz) activity at the vertex was observed on the EEG in 1 patient. Interictal SPECT in 2 patients showed decreased blood flow in both parietal areas, consistent with bilateral parietal abnormalities on T2- and T1-weighted MRIs. Ictal SPECT in 1 patient showed increased blood flow in the right parietal and frontopolar areas. The present 2 patients had clinically asymmetric tonic seizures, most likely resulting from spreading of the ictal activity from the parietal lesions via the superior longitudinal fasciculus to the SMA. Bilateral, homologous lesions in the parietal area might cause disinhibition on the unilateral epileptogenic side.